DIary of a Chronic Abscess

This started off as a reply to all the comments on the last post, then I came to the conclusion it would merit a post in its own right.

First of all, thanks for all the comments and good wishes, everyone.

I've no happy "poultice full of snot" story to share yet.  The pink spot on the back of his heel is still there but seems less soft.  There is a small amount of black stuff coming out where the poultice meets the top of the PHW wrap - I'm not sure if this is a little bit of thrushy goop coming from his frog or if it's old black pus working its way out from the bottom.

Right now, I'm still tempted to rip off the hoof wrap, unplug the hole and really go after it for a couple of days.  I'm reluctant to head down the antibiotic route for two reasons, the first being that I've never found them to help with hoof abscesses before.  Years ago, we had a similar protracted abscess story with our little pony Rosie which the Vet initially treated with penicillin, after opening the abscess.  Ten days later, he was back and ended up removing literally half her sole to try to get it to drain again.  Apparently antibiotics kill the infection, but the pus and dead bacterial matter is still in the foot, only now it's no longer liquid so it's ten times harder to get it to drain.

The other thing which is making me think twice about antibiotics is Aero's history.  We spent the entire summer of his seventh year treating an infection in his right foreleg - we think he picked up a thorn during his first ever event.  He won the event, but lost the rest of the season while we went through a seemingly endless cycle of poulticing, medicating, resting, bringing slowly back into work, leg swelling up again.  He had three courses of different antibiotics and in the end the Vets and I all agreed they weren't helping and the thorn was going to have to come out by itself.  What eventually got it out was a garlic poultice, but that was very severe and actually burned him like a blistering agent (some of you might also be old enough to remember blistering!) and I'm really reluctant to do that again.

I'm going to keep up the soaking and poulticing for the next day or two, but on Thursday I will assess where we are and I may revisit the antibiotics idea.  I'm hoping to turn him out in the arena for a while each day (movement would help), but we've just had yet another night of torrential rain and unless it clears up really well this afternoon so that the arena dries out, he's going to have to stay in all day.

The other thing I'm trying to do is to get my hands on a bottle of a homeopathic treatment "Hydropathics Chronic Abscess."  It's worth a try, especially since he has a history of his own immune system not working too well.

I'm off to boil the kettle and soak the Animalintex now...

Diary of a Chronic Abscess

(Also know as Aero's Diary)

I diligently soaked Aero's foot in a Cider Vinegar solution for two days, then the Clean Trax solution arrived in the post and I settled down to treat Aero with it on Thursday morning.  I decided to soak his foot for an hour this time, so we settled down for the long haul, Aero munching on his hay net, Dylan waiting patiently outside the stable door and me playing Sudoku on my phone, while making sure Aero didn't move around and risk pulling the soaking boot off.


After the hour was up, I carefully followed the Clean Trax instructions and bandaged a plastic bag onto his foot, leaving it there for a further 45 minutes "to allow the vapours to permeate the hoof."  Ok, so, job done.

I kept him in overnight and checked him the following morning.  It looked good - the abscessed foot (left front) was no longer noticeably hotter than the others, the glands in his throat seemed to have reduced and most importantly, I asked him to trot for a few strides up the drive towards the yard and he seemed ok.


Cue Saturday morning.  This was the day I was going to check him out fully - I actually felt I would jinx his recovery if I trotted him up properly on Friday, so I decided to give him an extra day to improve once I thought I'd seen some improvement.

I touched the heel of the left front.  Hot.  I touched the heel of the right front.  Much, much cooler.  I held the palm of my hand over the front of the left hoof.  Definitely warm.  I held the palm of my hand over the front of the right hoof.  Definitely cool.  Once again, the glands in his throat were up.  Once again, he was lame at walk.  Once again, back to the drawing board.

It was time for some reflection.  I came to the conclusion that I screwed up big time the day the chunk broke off his hoof.  At that stage, I should have poulticed the hole left by the break for a couple of days and I should then have kept his foot as clean as possible, ie bandaged and protected from dirt and re-infection for as long as it took - probably weeks.  Instead, I took the "Ah, sure it'll drain away by itself in the field" approach, and turned him out into my paddock.  This might have worked if we were having anything approximating a normal summer here, but with the huge quantities of rain we've been having, large tracts of my paddock are under water.  Because of this, Aero has had no choice but to slosh around in mucky water, and instead of the infection in his foot draining out, more dirt and infection worked their way in.  When I thought about it, if the Hoof Stuff packing material and PHW resin wrap allow moisture to flow out, then it follows that bacteria and infection can flow in too.

My initial reaction was to cut off the PHW wraps, clean out the hole where the break occurred and start poulticing and bandaging from scratch.  I even went out and bought a sheet metal snips just to cut off the wraps!  Then when I brought Aero in from the paddock and scrubbed his foot, I noticed a soft pink spot at the back of his heel.  Could I focus on this point and get the abscess to break through?

I shelved the Snipping plan for the moment, pulled out the Davis boot and started hot-tubbing with salt water.  Then I applied an Animalintex poultice, bandaging it onto his hoof and protecting it with one of Flurry's Cavallo Sport Boots.  I was hoping to find the poultice full of pus that evening, but no such luck.


Hot-tubbed again with the Davis boot, applied the poultice again.  Same story on Sunday morning, a disappointingly clean poultice.

Lather, rinse, repeat.

Please let it end soon.

Aero's Diary

Unfortunately, this has turned into "Diary of a Chronic Hoof Abscess."

As expected, a chunk of Aero's hoof wall sheared off, just the day before Anja the AEP practitioner was due to call.

The missing chunk.  You can also see where the abscess broke through at the coronet

I cleaned it and soaked his foot in a bucket of Epsom salts, but it is quite badly damaged and you can see that the weakness continues upwards through the hoof near the heel.

You can see the crack continues up the hoof wall

The good news, though, is that any pus should be able to drain away quite easily now, but the bad news is that being so open, it's very susceptible to re-infection.

When Anja called the next day, she tidied up the break, cleaned the opening and stuffed it with Hoof Stuff, which is made from honey, Zinc Oxide and cotton wool.  It adheres to the cavity, aids healing, allows drainage and acts as a barrier while the hole is growing out.  Hope it works!

Crevice cleaned and stuffed, the screws are to hold the resin bandage in place 

Aero was clearly still very sore on this foot, and our conclusion was that the sole is having to carry too much weight because there is no hoof wall at that point.  She felt that putting him back in PHW wraps would benefit him and help to support the weakened hoof wall, while at the same time allowing normal circulation to continue, allowing the hoof to breathe and enabling me to soak it or Clean Trax it as necessary.

All wrapped up

Initially, he has been very sore, not quite on three legs but not far off it.  There is still significant heat in this foot, centred at the heel.  I am planning to Clean Trax it just as soon as I get my hands on a bottle (tomorrow hopefully) because I suspect that the solution I used last week was gone off - it's supposed to be kept in the fridge, but that bottle had travelled around France with us for four weeks.

I've also been reading up about abscesses on various forums.  The current thinking really seems to be "let it drain by itself" and to use Epsom Salts or Cider Vinegar (a new one on me) in a solution to soak the foot.  Having already spent a week soaking his foot in Epsom Salts, I think I will try the Cider Vinegar this time.

Any other suggestions will be gratefully received.  It is so hard to see him in pain all the time, he's a sweet boy and he doesn't deserve this.